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Pharmacy College Apps To Be Scrutinized for Plagiarism

By Dian Schaffhauser

05/17/11

The American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy (AACP) will be using a plagiarism checking service to assess admission essays going forward. The organization, which comprises 120 accredited colleges and schools of pharmacy, has adopted Turnitin for Admissions from iParadigms to check essays submitted through its Pharmacy College Application Service (PharmCAS). PharmCAS provides a centralized application service for applicants applying to participating schools. The association's member institutions have 5,900 faculty; 54,700 students enrolled in professional programs; and 5,400 people pursuing graduate study.

PharmCAS' service provider, Liaison International, will handle integration of the Turnitin application. In turn, that integration will enable admissions offices at member schools to review reports about applicant essays assessing authenticity and similarity.

"After surveying AACP's member pharmacy schools and hearing that the majority were supportive of incorporating plagiarism detection software into [PharmCAS], we knew we had to move forward with the addition of plagiarism detection software," said Jennifer Athay, director of student affairs for the association. "We are looking forward to increasing the honesty and integrity of the pharmacy school application process through the use of Turnitin for Admissions."

The Turnitin service compares content from submitted documents to a database of existing content to generate a "similarity report," which highlights and provides links to any significant matches found within the text. By pinpointing potential unoriginal content, the service can help admissions' staff decide whether plagiarism, duplication, collusion, or other problems exist with the application.

About the Author

Dian Schaffhauser is a writer who covers technology and business for a number of publications. Contact her at dian@dischaffhauser.com.